lots of stuff, python names, xquery to html, xml regex clean-ish

pythonCode/personTestingOutput/smbd.xml

@@ -0,0 +1,199 @@
+<xml><p>SOMETHING MUST BE DONE!</p>
+
+<p>By <ent type='PERSON'>RICHARD</ent> M. EBELING</p>
+
+<p>During hard times there are few phrases as frequently heard
+as, "Something must be done!" And what is usually meant by the
+phrase is that governmental action is needed to cure the
+economic woes of society.</p>
+
+<p>In other words, government spending should be increased to
+raise the demand for goods and services; interest rates should
+be lowered to stimulate investment activity; protection should
+be given to domestic producers to insulate them from the
+unscrupulous "poaching" of foreign producers; public-works
+projects should be used to guarantee a job at a "living wage"
+to all of those desiring to work.</p>
+
+<p>We live in an era that has seen the bankruptcy of socialism,
+the failure of the welfare state, the corrupting influences of
+governmental regulatory activity, the irresponsibility of
+government deficit-spending and the unprincipled political
+pandering to every conceivable special-interest group. And yet
+still the cry is heard: "Something must be done!"--by the
+government.</p>
+
+<p>Fifty-five years ago, the English economist <ent type='PERSON'>John Maynard</ent>
+Keynes published his book The General Theory of Employment,
+Interest and Money. He ended the volume by pointing out to his
+readers, "The ideas of economists and political philosophers,
+both when they are right and when they are wrong, are more
+powerful than is commonly understood. Indeed the world is
+ruled by little else. Practical men, who believe themselves to
+be quite exempt from any intellectual influences, are usually
+the slaves of some defunct economist."</p>
+
+<p>At the end of the twentieth century, <ent type='NORP'>Americans</ent>, and indeed
+practically the entire world, are the slaves of defunct
+collectivist economists of half a century ago. Faced with the
+trauma and tribulations of <ent type='EVENT'>the Great Depression</ent>, intellectuals
+of almost every stripe came to the conclusion that individual
+freedom and free markets could not be trusted to either
+deliver the goods or the jobs that seemed to be so desperately
+needed. Their only disagreements were over the form which
+government management should take.</p>
+
+<p>Marxists looked to <ent type='GPE'>Moscow</ent> and <ent type='PERSON'>Stalin</ent>'s five-year plans. A
+socialist command economy might be harsh and lacking in some
+of the "bourgeois" freedoms, they believed, but at least
+everyone had a job; and planning assured that society's
+resources would not stand idle.</p>
+
+<p><ent type='NORP'>Fascists</ent> looked to <ent type='GPE'>Rome</ent> and <ent type='GPE'>Berlin</ent>. Even though <ent type='PERSON'>Hitler</ent>'s
+racial policies in the 1930s became an uncomfortable
+embarrassment, fascism, as an economic system, still appealed
+to many. Here, government did not have to nationalize
+industry. It could instead plan the economy in partnership
+with business and labor--setting wages and prices and
+establishing employment and production targets for growth and
+stability.</p>
+
+<p>Keynes and his "<ent type='ORG'>New Economics</ent>" seemed to offer a third way.
+Government did not have to nationalize or directly plan an
+economy. By use of government deficit spending and
+manipulation of interest rates through control of the money
+supply, government planners could influence the demand for
+goods and services and the amount of private investment
+activity. By using these policy tools, government could
+indirectly manage an economy for "full employment."</p>
+
+<p>Over the last fifty years, just about every variation on the
+collectivist economic theme has been tried. And every one has
+turned into disaster.</p>
+
+<p><ent type='ORG'>Central</ent> planning has twisted men's souls and ravaged their
+bodies. Both <ent type='NORP'>communist</ent> and fascist forms of planning have
+denied human beings their most basic freedoms and produced
+nothing but poverty and terror.</p>
+
+<p>And while Keynesian economics and neo-mercantilist trade
+policies have appeared less visibly destructive of freedom and
+prosperity, their effects have been no less detrimental.
+Moreover, in the name of "full employment" and "economic
+stabilization," the economic power of governments in the
+<ent type='NORP'>Western</ent> world has become immense. Governments in <ent type='GPE'>America</ent> and
+western <ent type='LOC'>Europe</ent> now absorb anywhere from twenty-five to
+seventy-five percent of all of the wealth produced by the
+people in these nations. <ent type='ORG'>Governmental</ent> regulations intrude into
+every corner of economic life. Government determines who can
+work and under what conditions, how products may be produced
+and in what manner they may be marketed, what kind of profits
+may be earned, and what level of wages must be paid.</p>
+
+<p>Nor have Keynesian "demand management" policies brought
+economic stability. The post-<ent type='EVENT'>World War</ent> II period has seen
+nothing but unending cycles of booms and busts, inflations and
+recessions. And with every enlargement in the size of
+government has come an increased number of groups in the
+society dependent upon the continuation of governmental
+spending and protection. The corruption of our legislative
+processes is merely one aspect of the political consequences
+of Keynesian economics put into practice.</p>
+
+<p>During the first half of this century, many economists and
+political philosophers were drunk with the idea of power. They
+suffered from what the <ent type='NORP'>Austrian</ent> economist <ent type='PERSON'>Friedrich</ent> A. <ent type='PERSON'>Hayek</ent>
+has called "the pretense of knowledge." They were convinced
+that they had the wisdom and ability to plan, guide and direct
+the lives of millions. Their minds had given them the insight
+and knowledge to know how to "set things right."</p>
+
+<p>Market demand was too low? They knew just the right amount of
+government spending to rectify the problem. <ent type='ORG'>Wealth</ent> was
+unfairly distributed? They knew just the right amount of
+taxation and redistribution of wealth to assure "economic
+justice." Industry and jobs were not where they should be in
+the economy? They knew just where industry should be located
+and where jobs should be created.</p>
+
+<p>Through the public educational process and other forms of
+government propaganda, <ent type='NORP'>Americans</ent> were brainwashed into
+believing them. And even though every economic intervention
+has failed and continues to fail, <ent type='NORP'>Americans</ent> still believe
+them. Why? Because they have been conditioned to believe our
+government masters and brainwashers when they tell us that
+next time "they will get it right," that they have learned
+from their mistakes, and that <ent type='NORP'>Americans</ent> should just continue
+to trust them.</p>
+
+<p>But they are not to be trusted. Not only because power
+corrupts, but also because they can never know how to do all
+of the things they promise to do. No mind or group of minds
+can ever have the ability or capacity to master all of the
+knowledge and information that is required to plan, direct or
+guide an economy.</p>
+
+<p>The value of a market economy is that it leaves each
+individual free to plan his own affairs and to use his own
+knowledge as he sees fit. But if he is to benefit personally
+from that knowledge, he knows that he must use it in a way
+that serves the ends of society. He can earn a living only by
+using his knowledge to fulfill the wants and desires of others
+in the peaceful social order of voluntary exchange.</p>
+
+<p>Competitively established market prices, both for resources
+and commodities, transmit across the entire economy
+information about the ever-changing supply-and-demand
+conditions to which each member of the society must adjust if
+he is to go about his business of earning a living. The market
+incorporates and encapsulates more knowledge and information
+than any economic planner or interventionist can ever hope to
+know or master.</p>
+
+<p>But if the market is to fulfill its informational tasks, it is
+vital that we return to first principles. By protecting and
+respecting individual life and property, government can help
+to secure the conditions for prosperity; but government cannot
+create that prosperity. Prosperity comes only from men
+applying their minds and the means available to them for
+various desired ends. Prosperity, therefore, can only come
+from freedom, because only when men are free do they have the
+interest and the incentive to set their minds to work.</p>
+
+<p>What does this mean in terms of economic policy? The exact
+opposite of what the economic planners and social engineers
+desire. Government's role in society must be reduced to the
+much ridiculed "night-watchman state." And government
+expenditures must be lowered to only those needed to protect
+individual liberty and private-property rights.</p>
+
+<p>This means: no governmental subsidies; no governmental
+protectionist privileges; no governmentally sponsored
+monopolies or cartels; no governmental licensing of
+occupations or professions; no governmental regulation of
+industry or the workplace; no governmental setting or
+influencing of wages or prices; no public-works projects; no
+governmental "demand management" policies; no governmental
+control of money.</p>
+
+<p>As we approach the end of the twentieth century, we are at a
+dead end with collectivist and interventionist economic
+policy. Something must be done! But not by the government! The
+place to start is to recognize that we are the intellectual
+victims of defunct economists and political philosophers of a
+bygone era and, more important, to recognize that governmental
+policies are the cause, not the cure, of our economic
+problems.</p>
+
+<p>Professor <ent type='PERSON'>Ebeling</ent> is the <ent type='PERSON'>Ludwig von</ent> Mises Professor of
+Economics at <ent type='ORG'>Hillsdale College</ent>, <ent type='GPE'>Hillsdale</ent>, <ent type='GPE'>Michigan</ent>, and also
+serves as vice-president of academic affairs at <ent type='ORG'>The Future</ent> of
+Freedom <ent type='ORG'>Foundation</ent>.
+
+------------------------------------------------------------
+From the May 1991 issue of <ent type='ORG'>FREEDOM DAILY</ent>,
+Copyright (c) 1991, <ent type='ORG'>The Future</ent> of Freedom <ent type='ORG'>Foundation</ent>,
+PO Box 9752, <ent type='GPE'>Denver</ent>, <ent type='GPE'>Colorado</ent> 80209, 303-777-3588.
+Permission granted to reprint; please give appropriate credit
+and send one copy of reprinted material to the <ent type='ORG'>Foundation</ent>.
+</p></xml>